Mixed response greets plans for new emission standards

In addition, the latest forecasts suggest that with passenger cars already accounting for 12% of overall CO2 emissions in the EU, maintaining the status quo would lead to a 20% rise in emissions from cars by the year 2000 and a 36% increase by 2010.

These two statistics underline the scale of the problem facing legislators, who have the difficult job of encouraging manufacturers to produce environmentally-friendly cars without imposing unacceptably high costs on the industry.

Most environmentalists have tentatively welcomed the vehicle emissions standards currently being prepared by the European Commission.

But some groups, such as the European Clean Air Campaign – comprising five major environmental, consumer and health lobbies – are warning that they will not be enough to solve the grave pollution problem caused by the ever-growing volume of traffic on Europe’s roads.

The Commission’s actions to curb pollution are based on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change concluded in 1992, which commits the Union to stabilising carbon dioxide emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000.

Guidelines for measures to be taken were set down in a framework directive in March 1994 and at a meeting in Berlin last spring, when the parties to the convention agreed reduction targets for the beginning of the next millennium.

Among a range of measures to curb pollution from motor vehicles, and bring air quality into line with World Health Organisation guidelines, are the new emission standards being prepared by the Commission for post-2000 and post-2005.

In its communication A Community strategy to reduce CO2 emissions from passenger cars and improve fuel economy, adopted in the week before Christmas, the Commission took the first step towards honouring its commitment to consider the best approach to reducing the fuel consumption of newly-registered vehicles by 2005.

Its calculations indicated that the total cost of improving fuel economy by 40% would be between 940 and 2,270 ecu per vehicle, but that fuel efficiency savings would more than outweigh this additional cost.

CO2 emissions would, it calculated, be reduced by 17.5% by 2005 and 30.1% by 2010, compared with current trends, but the overriding increase in car numbers would prevent overall emissions from falling below 1990 levels until the end of the first decade of the next century.

This is a point taken up by lobby group Transport and Environment (T&E), which insists that reductions in emissions are relatively futile unless something is done to curb the inexorable rise in car numbers.

“An increase in fuel tax will reduce traffic growth and can – according to scientific calculations – actually reduce total CO2 emissions from car traffic,” it argues.

But the Commission’s favoured approach to reducing CO2 pollution is through agreement with the auto industry and importers to draw up emission targets “within a certain time-frame”, combined with fiscal measures to promote fuel-efficient cars within an overall initiative on vehicle taxation.

It will also seek to encourage research into the development of zero-emitting cars following the recent establishment of the “Task Force on the Car of Tomorrow”. Clear labelling of emission levels from motor vehicles would also prove helpful, argues the Commission.

The European Clean Air Campaign describes the draft proposals as “a step forward, but still not enough for Europe’s politicians to claim that they are really tackling citizens’ concerns over poor air quality”.

From 2000, the group is calling for fiscal advantages for manufacturers prepared to meet 2005 targets early. These targets would probably be roughly equivalent to emission standards already in force in California.

Besides demanding that all vehicles should meet the very tightest standards by 2000, the group is calling for the phasing-out of leaded petrol by 2000, greater reductions in sulphur in diesel fuel by 2005 and limiting benzene levels in petroleum to 1%.

As part of its ongoing action programme, the Commission is expected to publish within weeks the results of the “Auto-Oil Programme”, a research project into pollution in seven EU cities – Athens, Cologne, Copenhagen, London, Madrid, Milan and The Hague – carried out in conjunction with car industry representative ACEA and the European oil industry, represented by Europia.

On behalf of its 29 member companies, Europia is lobbying hard for the Commission to publish the findings of the Auto-Oil Programme in full, claiming they show that existing legislation will be sufficient to reach reduction targets for both carbon monoxide and benzene.

This is supported by new ACEA Secretary-General Camille Blum, who stresses: “Since we have made such a comprehensive study, we should stick to the outcome. The whole purpose of this approach was to base future policy on a rational rather than an emotional basis.”T&E agrees that existing technologies and advanced research could solve the major problems presented by sulphur, nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons.

But it stresses that this will only be so “if politicians are brave enough to demand the use of the best available technology, if manufacturers are made fully responsible for the long-term performance of the equipment and if vehicle users maintain their vehicles properly”.

For Europia, the priority is the question of how to tackle nitrogen oxides and the knock-on effect these have on ozone and particulate matter production.

But the oil industry warns against “costly legislation” which “may put economic growth and jobs at risk, while still not meeting urban clean air criteria”.

It argues that a combination of tougher mandatory vehicle inspections, better engine maintenance and cleaner engines is the way to achieve the necessary goals, and would achieve clean air objectives for 90% of the EU’s urban population at a cost of 1.6 billion ecu annually over 15 years.

Rather than using costly technologies, Europia argues that the best approach for the remaining 10% is to introduce effective local traffic management, improved public transport and to replace old vehicles with new ones.

Commission officials admit that consideration is being given to a range of measures, with initial analysis of the Auto-Oil Programme suggesting that it might be most cost effective to concentrate on advanced car technologies.

Other ideas doing the rounds within the Commission are compulsory emission tests for annual car inspections in all member states, scrapping schemes and subsidies for alternative fuels.

Thought is also being given to a review of the motor tax system, including how to bring environmental costs into taxes and a general harmonisation of circulation taxes.